The "Butterfly Effect"...

[kidhawk]

The one and ONLY thing I was trying to Illustrate is that alot of people are trying to say that the 3 points from that non-field goal could simply be tacked onto the final score. I'm saying that's ridiculous. Everything would have been different at that point. Just the difference of us kicking off to them rather than them taking over on downs would have been huge timeline differece. Open the brains just a little, m'kay?

It's not anymore ridiculous than saying that we'd have any other reasonable outcome though. Just because things COULD have been different down the line doesn't mean it WOULD have been different. It's just discussion fodder for those who felt it was the wrong decision at the time. Nobody in their right mind thinks that any of this changes reality.

 

[BlueThunder]

I'm out... Wrong place for this thread...

 

[hawkmanj]

We had the lead with less than a minute left. that is all we need to know.

This.

/Thread.

 

[QuahHawk]

Good topic, I don't blame any one play. I def think if we had scored earlier Atlanta would have played differently. It all came down to Russell won the game for us and then the defense lost it. Blame it on the Bradley for play calling, Irvin or the D Line for not getting pressure, the LB's and CB's for not covering, or whatever you want but I am still damn proud. I was at peace with this loss. When we score that T it was the best feeling ever, almost like in the NFC championship. With 30 seconds left I new we could still lose but I was so happy we came from behind and Russell proved he was the best QB on the field I just couldn't get the smile off my face even when that field goal went through.

 

[bmorepunk]

Not that this needed repeating in yet ANOTHER thread, but the "butterfly effect" is all around us all the time. I mean if Russell Wilson had farted in the 2nd quarter we MAY have never scored. It's a good thing he held it in.

Interestingly enough, the example you're giving here is closer to the the butterfly effect than what the OP said. The butterfly effect is based on sensitive dependence on initial conditions in a deterministic nonlinear system. The effect in question is used to describe small changes in initial conditions in seemingly unrelated events.

The decisions and actions in the game directly effect the game and don't really meet the qualifications for the title. I do agree that if you kick the field goal you can't say with any certainty that the events that occur after that stay the same, but the use of "butterfly effect" here is a misnomer. I blame popular culture here.

Now if I take a dump and it somehow kills a camel in Egypt, we might be on to something.

 

[SE174]

This game will be a Dame Dameshek N "if" L episode in a couple years. :thcoffee:

 

[EL ROCKSTEADY]

There is something I've never brought up before but has bugged the hell out of me for decades. Everybody's gonna have to put on their "science" hats for this, as it involves infinate possible timelines from a single point in time. I know many of you here will already know what I'm talking about so just bear with me.

I'm going to use our loss to the Falcons as an example eventually, and that will work as an explanation of the myriad examples not only in football, but in our day to day lives as well. The decisions we all make in life creates new timelines that are either slightly or radically different than what would have happened had we made a different decision at that one point. Say for example, some night you were driving home from work, and were deciding whether or not to stop at the bar to knock back a few. You finally decided to just go home. Had you made the decision to stop by the bar instead, you could have met your future wife, or if not, you got in your car drunk, drove home and hit a kid and spent the next 20 years behind bars. But even if you had just stopped by the bar, not met anyone new, and just drove home uneventfully, the rest of your life would have still been different, maybe dramatically different from that point on than if you had just gone home without the stop at the bar. This is where Football comes in.

In listening to all the talk of our loss to the Falcons, I keep hearing "If we would have just kicked that field goal instead of going for it on 4th and 1, we would have won". BS. We may have won, but if we had successfully kicked a 3 there, the rest of the game would have been completely different. The play calling would have changed, and one difference breeds new timelines, and the complete complextion of the game would have been altered. We may not have had the big comeback, or perhaps we would have taken over the game at that point. Nobody will ever know. I'm just a little tired of people that think if we had just done one little thing different in the 1st quarter, it would have made the difference of win or loss. It may have, and it may not have. Just had to get that off my chest. Carry on.

GO HAWKS! (that's my new thing now) GOD I love that kid!

you are absolutely correct. Even if it was at the end of the half and the second half kick off was the same peoples mind sets would have been different. Every single thought from every single person involved with the game for the rest of the game would be different.

 

[BlueThunder]

Not that this needed repeating in yet ANOTHER thread, but the "butterfly effect" is all around us all the time. I mean if Russell Wilson had farted in the 2nd quarter we MAY have never scored. It's a good thing he held it in.

Interestingly enough, the example you're giving here is closer to the the butterfly effect than what the OP said. The butterfly effect is based on sensitive dependence on initial conditions in a deterministic nonlinear system. The effect in question is used to describe small changes in initial conditions in seemingly unrelated events.

The decisions and actions in the game directly effect the game and don't really meet the qualifications for the title. I do agree that if you kick the field goal you can't say with any certainty that the events that occur after that stay the same, but the use of "butterfly effect" here is a misnomer. I blame popular culture here.

Now if I take a dump and it somehow kills a camel in Egypt, we might be on to something.

Well, the "Butterfly Effect" refers to, at least from what my understanding is, if you go back in time and kill a butterfly that wouldn't have been killed had you not gone back in time, it could cause catastrophic effects to the future through tiny changes that became huge with the passage of time. I realize that my example was different than this, but the mechanics are the same... Thanks for understanding what I was trying to say.

 

[SuperFreak]

Good post from the OP I had been thinking along the same lines myself today as I replayed the game in my mind. At the time I though to myself " this is a panic move " and didn't care for it much later on someone here posted a sabermetric type breakdown showing it was the correct call. I am a big believer in trusting the math, if it was the correct call biased on what Pete and his staff believe and not a PC hormonal snap decision then I'm fine with it.

Lynch doesn't fumble and we also could have scored, and won the game.
Russell gets rid of the ball before instead of getting the sack we could have scored there too and won the game.
No reason to make ourselves sick over this, the window is opening for this club not closing.

 

[muxpux]

keep this in mind next time you discuss XL with someone. yeah the calls sucked, but the whole game would have played out differently had one call been not called.

 

[MORGULON]

One could also argue that if we score the field goal - the Falcons don't immediately score that TD on the big Roddy White catch on the ensuing drive. Additionally, if we scored then before half - theoretically the game could have been 13-6 or even 13-10 going into the half.

I actually thought that we should have kicked the field goal there not because the points were utterly important at the time but we need to slow that first half down. We were hemorrhaging really bad and I just felt if we could slow the game down we would bounce back dramatically. That happened too late though it did happen.

Anything could have happened - the bottom line though is if we had three more points - we would have won.

I get the butterfly effect somewhat and believe it to be true to an extent.

Having said that, I agree that being down ONLY 13 points on the road in the playoffs to a pretty damned good team at the end of the first half.....YOU TAKE the 3 and come out for the second half with a little momentum and receive the kickoff. I dont think our defense was bad at all with all the young players we have (not an excuse) and like I said before, against one of the best offenses in the NFL in their house!

Now please excuse me, Im going to go knock a few back at the local bar .

 

[scutterhawk]

There is something I've never brought up before but has bugged the hell out of me for decades. Everybody's gonna have to put on their "science" hats for this, as it involves infinate possible timelines from a single point in time. I know many of you here will already know what I'm talking about so just bear with me.

I'm going to use our loss to the Falcons as an example eventually, and that will work as an explanation of the myriad examples not only in football, but in our day to day lives as well. The decisions we all make in life creates new timelines that are either slightly or radically different than what would have happened had we made a different decision at that one point. Say for example, some night you were driving home from work, and were deciding whether or not to stop at the bar to knock back a few. You finally decided to just go home. Had you made the decision to stop by the bar instead, you could have met your future wife, or if not, you got in your car drunk, drove home and hit a kid and spent the next 20 years behind bars. But even if you had just stopped by the bar, not met anyone new, and just drove home uneventfully, the rest of your life would have still been different, maybe dramatically different from that point on than if you had just gone home without the stop at the bar. This is where Football comes in.
Carry on.
GO HAWKS! (that's my new thing now) GOD I love that kid!

Ok, so back to the "Bar", is there a Seahawks game going on the TV?
By the way, my wife would be pissed if I came home with a woman ,and especially if I told her that I just found the love of my life

 

[BlueTalon]

how much has Americas family integrity been compromised due to men meeting their wives in bars? divorce rate?

Phfff... no kidding! Why meet someone in a bar when there's the whole internet out there?

 

[BlueThunder]

Ok, so back to the "Bar", is there a Seahawks game going on the TV?
By the way, my wife would be pissed if I came home with a woman ,and especially if I told her that I just found the love of my life

how much has Americas family integrity been compromised due to men meeting their wives in bars? divorce rate?

Phfff... no kidding! Why meet someone in a bar when there's the whole internet out there?

Heh Heh.... Yeah, you guys are on board. *tapping my head with a wink*... uh huh... :lol:

 

[RolandDeschain]

Don't bother trying to figure his posts out, Blue.

 

[RichNhansom]

Same result isn't it?
Meet your wife at the bar or become someones wife in prison. Desirability is different but that's just a technicality.

 

[salamander]

To me the decision making in the first half is irrelevant because we came back to take the lead. Being down 20-0 actually sparked the required second half performance that was necessary. Who knows if we execute with the same sense of urgency if its a one score game. Also, to be honest, Atlanta may have come out with more urgency in a closer game.

There were only two mistakes made.
1. Scoring too soon at the end. If we could have timed it better they wouldn't have had 25 seconds left
2. Letting them catch two long passes with < 25 seconds left to get into field goal range

 

[TriCHawk]

I completely get what you're saying Blue. I said the same thing in a G+ comment a couple of days ago. Should they have gone for the 3? IMO, yes. I was PO'd that they didn't at the time, but yeah, everything after that point would have been different. Maybe so different that it would have changed the game completely either for or against.

 

[5_Golden_Rings]

It's not that you went for that 4th down. It's that you ran it with the up-back instead of using your dynamic quarterback on a run-pass option.

Still, as RW said, that play did not define the game.